


A Penny for the Old Guy

by Azmera



Series: The Dynamite Club [2]
Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra, Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Gen, Spirit Shenanigans, Spirit World
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-27
Updated: 2017-02-27
Packaged: 2018-09-27 08:18:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,157
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9984920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Azmera/pseuds/Azmera
Summary: Oh my soul, be prepared for the coming of the Stranger.Be prepared for him who knows how to ask questions.There is one who remembers the way to your door:Life you may evade, but Death you shall not.You shall not deny the Stranger.





	

In the winter the wind echoes like star-song from the mouth of his cave, cuts like a knife and digs itself into his carapace. The roots of his tree shift and clatter, and ice falls from the ceiling and pools in the dips in the floor. In the spring the ice melts, filling his home with lamentation, water falling like tears. The wind is bright and green and the cave smells of rot. In the summer the wind sings like a raven-hawk through the roots of his cave, and sunlight leaks through the cracks in the ceiling, pooling where the ice melted away, burning away the rot and the bright green of spring. In the fall the light turns gold, and the wind roars and wails above him and around him as storms rage and die, and the cycle repeats.

He does not notice these things, not anymore.

They’ve forgotten him, his face and his voice and his purpose-- but his name is still whispered in the shadows. That old lie: be good, little one, or the Face Stealer will find you. He would not leave his home if he could. Not for mortals, who flicker like light-bugs and fall like mayflies.

No. He is _found._ When he needs to be, when he is wanted. No sooner, no later. And they all find him, in the end.

.

The story does not start with the ocean-eyed sister-host who came looking for answers, or the little sister-host who sought Push and Pull. With the wolf-headed sister-host carrying a spear, or the amber-eyed one who sought to buy his knowledge, or the starlight-voiced one who called him _brother_ , as if any little flicker-spark of a mortal was his equal.

It starts with a smile, a voice, consuming rage. A body with no soul.

.

Something is missing, and he knows, it itches behind his face, it burns, the divide. The space between his face and his self.

One solution presents itself: fill the void.

.

Many, so many, seek him. Have sought, are seeking, will seek. The winding stone and falling water, the incomplete, empty darkness, the void. In him like a disease, not won, but growing like rot, the emptiness.

The first had eyes like fire and skin like moonlight, and she smiled in the dark when she found him.

Eyes like starlight and a spirit’s touch. Nimble fingers and a knife-slash smile. A missing eye, a silver scar. Eyes like clouds obscuring the sun. A smile like water running over stones. So many, so many.

.

A knife-smile; emerald eyes; skin like moonlight. Worthy, yes, yes. Thin, too thin, a void that grows every day.

Hair like coal and a spirit’s touch.

Moonlight-eyes and the thoughts of a thousand stars. Spirits aren’t much better.

Voice like a desert, eyes like water, a sandpaper laugh.

Too thin, too big, and the void, growing, hungry, empty.

.

_You’ve my sister’s touch about you. Tamashi. Gone, these many lifetimes. You’ve no_ right _._

Eyes like amber and a voice like honey. He rages against it, fire for fire, and the Avatar rages back, ice and stone (Order, growing stronger), and he takes it, steals the fire and the brightness.

He knows, he knows. Tamashi is angry.

She has no right. She is _gone_.

.

A thief, a beggar, a king, a princess, a peasant, a lord. A merchant, a painter, a carpenter, a hero of war.

Emptiness.

Warriors, so many, thoughts of blood. (Chaos, growing.)

Kill me? With the little thorns the gnats carry? Does a hornet’s sting anger a komodo-rhino? You could try, little one. We will dance, yes, oh, yes, we will.

Yawning emptiness fills him.

.

A thousand lifetimes in the blink of an eye. A martyr, a zealot, a candle-maker. A printer, a painter, a king among thieves. A poet, a princess, a woman-of-the-night. Find him, find the winding stone and falling water, the incomplete, empty darkness. All seeking the void.

It grows.

.

The water-rat comes with mask and spear and shield, eyes burning like ice.

_I know the end of all things, Avatar, and this is not my fate._ Her lips curved upwards, her hair spilling from behind her face, her eyes that are his opening, wide and guileless. _You think to split me open like an overripe fruit? Pluck the nothing from my skull and let the emptiness fill up the world? Crack me like a nut with_ that _little stick? No. A sword, perhaps. A sword to cut all things. But I’d be free before one found my neck._

_For black-as-night hair and sapphire eyes and blood-red lips? A trade, little spark. Faces for faces._ Her lips curl. _Fond, then. But not in love._

_I am generous, Avatar, I am kind. Love yourself, and flee._

Ice-fire burns and the Tree winds around him, constricting. (Order, growing.)

.

He turns from the stairs, the blue-white wind of winter that wails like a mother’s loss. The dips and rises of the cave are almost worn smooth from his passage.

The wind smells of salt and moonlight, and he turns.

_Oh, my old friend, it’s been a long time._

Not the first, not the last of you to visit me, Avatar. _Once you thought to kill me, little spark._ There have been so many.

Flicker-sparks, shining so brightly, but so short-lived. What will you give, what will you give, little sister-host? Favors for favors, and everything with a price.

A gift, Avatar, for the visits you’ve paid unreturned.

.

Eyes like the ocean and a voice like the night. _I cannot give the answers you seek, little spark. But there are others, strong in ways that I am not._ The Bear, the Owl, the Dragon-of-the-Dawn. _The window to all things. Seek and do not return, little spark. My debt to you, Avatar, is paid._

The wind wails like the ice of winter, and sunlight drips through the gloom. Odd.

_Do not return, I said, Avatar_.

A shard of sunlight, lighting the dark cave. Thin and sharp, so sharp, sharp enough to cut the worlds--

_A sword to cut all things. Oh, Avatar, very good._ _But I’ll be free before it finds my neck._

I told you, Avatar, sister-host, I _am_ , and I know the end of all things.

.

Order and Chaos are as he remembers, and Tamashi is finally free. There is balance again, but _balance is a fickle thing, little spark_.Difficult to hold for longer than the space of a heartbeat.

It takes no longer. Order and Chaos are angry, as they always are, but Tamashi is defiant. _You will not hold me_ , she says.

For an instant there is clarity. He watches as Order and Chaos move through the space between-and-out, and the worlds align and shift and shimmer, shining like countless jewels, and Tamashi turns to him and smiles.

_Thank you, Koh._

_For you, sister, anything._

.

As it was in the beginning, it is now and ever shall be. World without end.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from T.S. Eliot's "The Hollow Men"; quotation from "Choruses from the Rock."


End file.
